


Homecoming.

by DitescoMori



Category: Marvel, Marvel (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-07-06
Updated: 2014-07-06
Packaged: 2018-02-07 18:14:03
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 672
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1908852
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DitescoMori/pseuds/DitescoMori
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He doesn't know if he trying to fix the things he's broken, or if he's just trying to fix himself.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Homecoming.

“Clint, leave it. It is broken.” 

He isn’t sure if they talk about him or the watch he has been trying to fix for the past couple of days. The small kitchen table lays scattered with small pincers, cogs and nails, miniscule pieces of a jigsaw puzzle he has been investing all of his efforts in solving. Its hands have not moved since the last time he touched it. A quarter before midnight. He can still hear the door shutting behind her. 

“Honestly, Clint, don’t waste your time. It’s broken,” Steve is gentler than Tony, but he chooses to ignore the condescending tone all the same. 

They talk about the light he has been trying to fix for the past few months. The same one he left on just so she wouldn’t have to waste any of her time in finding her keys once she came back. She never did. The circuits of the light bulb snapped and they burned the whole installation. 

“Clint, why don’t you leave that and join us for a moment?” Bruce inquiries from the threshold of the door, and without even looking back, he knows he is holding his glasses as he leans against the door. 

He doesn’t take his eyes away from the wall he has been painting since yesterday. She always thought it needed more color, and complained about the unrepaired holes in the wall that once held his posters. Regardless of not having the same taste in music, they always ended up in the same concerts. 

“Are you being serious right now, Boss?” Kate is dumbfounded to find him cleaning the apartment and sorting everything in it. Where magazines once rested, scattered all over the place, along with books and dirty laundry, he has managed to leave everything pristine and in order. 

It takes them one night to sit him down in the Avengers Tower. It’s raining outside, thick drops of water violently rattling the windows. 

“She is not coming back,” They think it is prudent if a woman eases the news to him, and Pepper reaches out to hold both of his hands from across the table. It’s been three months since Natasha Romanoff’s airplane was lost in the Atlantic Ocean, and despite the joined efforts of every single international agency, they have not found the plane. She gently reminds him all of the facts he has heard continuously over the last few months. 

“Or her body”, he is always swift to interject every time. “She is not dead. She would be ashamed of you,” he spats at them, eyes blood-shot red. “If it was any of you, she would have torn the world down looking for all of you.” He gets up and leaves the kitchen. 

He doesn’t return until the next week, wearing the same clothes and with grime and dirt in the otherwise lustrous strands of his sandy hair **.**   His eyes settle on the light that has been obscure for months, finally shedding light by the door. Instinctively, he turns to face the clock and stares long enough to acknowledge the gentle moving of the arrows as the seconds trick by. His blood starts to boil once more, believing they have fixed the things he has been desperate about mending, all the details he had prepared for her homecoming. 

“Who—?” He turns to battle the shadows before the spots a mane of vermillion stepping away from them. 

“You can’t even fix a clock and a light by yourself, can you Barton?” 

He doesn’t hesitate in throwing his arms at her, enveloping her in an embrace that rekindles every single memory he has of her: the time it takes his hand to run all the way down her hair, the shape of her frame within his grasp; the gentle smell ebbing from the pores of her skin. 

She spares another witty retort as she throws her arms around him as well, and Clint can feel her smiling against his chest. 

“I know, Barton, I know. Trust me. I know.”

"Welcome home."


End file.
